CHRISTMAS WITH SOME POETS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17410, 12 December 1924, Page 10 (Supplement)

CHRISTMAS WITH SOME POETS.

BEAUTY, MYSTERY AND ALL GENTLENESS. (Copyright, published by special arrangement. ) Christmas with its mystery and worship, its adoration of a little child, its joys, spiritual and material, lias been a favourite theme with poets of divers gifts in all ages, and a complete anthology of the season would (ill a considerable volume. For the first poem inspired by Christmas we must go far back in time, long before the first Christmas itself, to the poet-seer who wrote the words so finely embodied in Handel's “ Messiah”—“ Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, the mighty God, the everasting Father, the Prince of Peace.” The words ring across the centuries to join the “ Magnificat,” that great joy song of Alary, motherelect of the promised Prince of Peace and the beautiful song of praise of Zacliarias. They are taken up and echoed by the angels bringing “good tidings of great joy,” swell out into the gloria in exeelsis, and elide softly and serenely into the “Nunc Dimitti . ” of Simeon. “ Lord now lettest Thou Thy servant depart- in peace, for mine eyes have seen Thy salvation.” From these instinctively one’s mind turns to that great ode in which Mil ton so sublimely paid tribute to Christmas and all that it meant and means to mankind. He shows how th? old religions had failed, and the w'orlcl grown weary and despairing, when the Lord of Christmas, laying aside His glory, Forsook the courts of everlasting day, Vnd chose with us a darksome house of mortal clay. In wonderful, stately verse- he tells how, to prepare the world for His coming, He sent down “ meek-eyed peace, crowned with olives green, to strike a universal peace through sea and land.” how the old false Pagan gods fled from their shrines, and the oracles became dumb, while in the dawn of a new and better day the mother laid her babe. “ the son of heaven’s eternal King,” to rest, and All about the courtly stable •Tright-ha messed angels sit in order serviceable. SHAKESPEARE AND TENNYSON. The same idea, of Christmas is found in Shakespeare’s beautiful lines in Hamlet : Some say that ever gainst that season come s Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated, The bird of dawning singeth all night long : And then, they say. no spirit dare stir abroad, f'he nights are wholesome, -'then no planets strike, No fairy takes nor witch hath power to charm, So hallow’d and so gracious is the time.

Tennyson very beautifully in “ in Memoriam ” makes the bells of three Christmas Eves tell of the progress of his soul, stricken at first with grief for the death of his friend, from sorrow to peace. On the first the bells answered each other in a mist, ringing in solemn, muffled tones, in their message of pence and goodwill. Trembling fingers turned the bright holly. Christmas games are played with a vain pretence of merriment, while eyes are dim. “ a rainy cloud possessed the earth.” and Christmas Eve falls sadly. By the next Christmas grief has grown gentler, the storm and passion of it gone. Nature lies, quiet under the silent snow, the yule' log sparkles in the ..frost, and calm is the keynote of this Christmas Eve. The third Christmas a change of home has broken the spell of sorrowful memories, old customs are set aside, and Christmas Eve “ falls strangely.” But the New Year bells “ ring out the grief that saps the mind.” ring out all selfish personal abandonment to sorrow, but ring in the “ fuller minstrel ” who sings of the better world to be. and of the Christ who comes again to it. FROM WILDE TO ROSSETTI. Oscar Wilde in one of his earlier poems takes, us back to the days heralding the first Christmas: “ Was this His coming!' I had hopes to see A scene of wondrous glory as was told Of some great God . . a ml now Some kneeling girl, with passionless pale fare. An angel with a lily in his hand. Anri over both the white wings of a dove— ” One of Mrs Meynell’s lovely poems is “ Unto us a Son is Given ” not lent.” she says. “ given to mankind. this One, this little welcome Son.” “ New every year, New born and newly dear. He comes with tidings and a. song The ages long, the ages long.” Browning in “Christmas Eve” secs in a. vision Christ Himself entering wherever two or three are truly gathered in His name whether it he in the little dissenting chapel scorned at first by the worshipper who tells the story, or in the Great St Peter's in Rome. Scott and Wordsworth, as also Herrick and Whittier and other poets of earlier days sing of Christmas and its old customs and pleasures, and Longfellow catches the spirit of it in the “Norman Baron.” moved by the Christmas hells and the carols of the minstrels to free his Saxon serfs. Some of the loveliest Christmas songs are sung by Christina Rossetti, whose .irO{ uo pf».uo}saq .\[».ms src.w aun?u ts.itj at her christening by inspiration. Each one is exquisite each a jewel in its way : “ Love came down at- Christmas, Love all lovely, love divine; Love was horn at Christmas. Stars and angels gave the sign ” And her Christmas Carol : “ Whoso hears a chiming for Christmas at the nighest. Hears a sound like Angels chanting in their glee, Hears a sound like palm-boughs waving in the highest. Hears a sound like ripple of a cry stal sea.. Sweeter than a prayer-hell for a Saint in dying, Sweeter than a- death-bell for a. Saint at. rest. Music struck in Heaven with earth's faint replying. ‘ Tiife is good, and death is good, for Christ is Best.'” SOME FAMOUS CAROL-POETRY. Some of the well-known and popular Christmas Carols are worthy of mention among Christmas verse from “O Gome, all ye Faithful.” the “ Adeste Fideles ” of the ancient church, to the modern favourite “ Hark, the Herald Angels sing.” Exquisite in its delicate beauty of conception and expression is the “ Manger Throne,” beginning : “ Like silver lamps in a distant shrine The stars are sparkling bright.” Each of the modern Christmas songs written by Phillips Brooks, also a charming carol and a. verse or two

from the best known of them may fittingly conclude this brief anthology of poetry inspired by Christmas: “ O little town of Bethlehem How still we see thee lie. Above thy deep and dreamless sleep The silent stars go by. Yet in thy dark streets shineth The Everlasting Light; The hopes and fears of all the years Are met in thee to-night.”